August 31, 2004

The summer ain't over yet

I've been looking at a few other blogs that I read regularly and wondering why the authors are not updating anymore. Of course, I haven't blogged in about forever, so I guess I'm not the only one having a busy summer. I'm sure mom is missing my entries, so I should make a little more effort to post.

I thought the main rush of work would be over in early August, but this past month has remained really hectic, work-wise. September is shaping up to be a little nuts, too.

Kerry moved out this morning. In between work and everything else, I tried to help her a little. I think my main contribution was accepting all of the stuff that she didn't want to keep but wasn't big enough to sell. I now have a huge surplus of kitchen ware, clothes hangers, and all kinds of little apartment odds and ends, not to mention enough cumin and tumeric to last me a lifetime.

Last week I saw Cher at the Metro Centre. I meant to post a gig update. It was quite the show. Excellent production. Maybe some other time.

I still have two other friends to help move this week, and I really need to sort through all the stuff in my apartment and organize a hallway/yard sale.

August 12, 2004

The Long Now Foundation

A while back I bookmarked this article on the the Long Now Foundation. It's a rambling article and it took me several attempts to actually start reading it and stick with it, however it's interesting and probably worthwhile in the end. Here's a little tidbit:

Can you give us some examples of long now thinking, historical that we are reaping the benefits of now?

Well there’s one very famous example, it’s an English example, there’s a college in Oxford called New College, which was built about five hundred years ago. The college is a big high building and it has very thick oak beams to support the ceiling. About twenty years ago those beams started to appear to be in such bad condition that it was necessary to replace them, so the dean of the college said to the head gardener - because Oxford has a lot of lands and forests, actually all over England – “We need a lot of oaks - what shall we do?” And the gardener said when they built that college they planted a grove of oaks, to replace those beams, and so they had been planted five hundred years in advance of their need – so that’s a kind of long term thinking. I don’t know that anybody is doing that kind of thing now.

August 09, 2004

Busker Festival

Meant to post this last week...

Thursday, after finally getting home from work at a decent hour (for the first time in weeks it seemed), I decided to enjoy the beautiful weather and walk down along the waterfront. I bought fish and chips for supper and I took in a few of the buskers at the festival going on this week. I have to say that I don't spend enough time appreciating all that Halifax has to offer. It's a beautiful city, with lots to see and do.

Mortgages

I've been thinking for a while that I'd like to stop renting, so I've finally got around to looking into mortgages. I think I'd probably like to get a condo, to minimize the cost and upkeep, as well as hopefully get a better location on my budget.

After reading a little and browsing some bank websites, I think I can probably afford somewhere between 115,000 and 150,000, depending on how long I amortize. I'd like to keep to the lower end and amortize for 15 years, but I haven't actually talked to anyone yet, much less applied for a mortgage, so who knows if I can really afford that much.

Any friends or family with advice are welcome to email me...

And in other news, apparently you can browse MLS listings online at mls.ca. You don't need to track down the book to browse, which is really nice.